New York SBDC Research Network

I would like to start this blog by saying what a pleasure it was to meet most of you at this week's staff training. It was a wonderful opportunity to add faces to the names that are becoming familiar. During this week's training, at the session regarding the updated MQS system that will debut next Spring, a point was made that the NAICS search function within the current MQS system is difficult to use at times. I would like to offer an alternative. The NAICS codes are listed online with definition throught the Census. Although the NAICS search function within MQS searches the text of the Census' NAICS directory, there is a way to do a tiered search of the directory. The search starts with one of twenty broad industry categories. For example, Construction codes begin with 23. After Construction is selected, searchers can choose Construction of Buildings (236), Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction (237), or Specialty Trade Contractors (238). After a three digit

Trying to stay on the bright side? I'm sure we'll be reading more about how we can conserve and make the most of what we have. Encouragement may come in the form of an article in Inc. magazine: Starting up in a Down Economy which looks at companies that got started in lean times. Some of the examples are household names like Coors, IBM, Domino's, Wikipedia, and Clif. On a more personal (financial) note, The Simple Dollar looks at protecting oneself and succeeding in challenging times. MSN Money: Smart Spending has a bit on it as well: Preparing for and Surviving an Economic Downturn Jan 11 2008 by Karen Datko And from Small Business Notes comes Surviving an Economic Downturn with tips specifically geared to small business owners.

Paul Rapp "is an intellectual-property lawyer with offices in Albany and Housatonic, Mass. He teaches art-and-entertainment law at Albany Law School, and regularly appears as part of the Copyright Forum on WAMC’s Vox Pop." He writes a regular column on intellectual property rights. His most recent column addresses the "Orphan Works” copyright and potential legislation regarding it. What is an orphan work? Paul cites Meredith L. Patterson's Radio Free Meredith where she uses this example about "your parent’s wedding pictures from 1955. You want to publish them? Guess what? The copyrights are probably owned by the photographer! Who was who? And is now where? You don’t know? Uh-oh." The proposed bill, H.R.5889, the Orphan Works Act of 2008 , seeks to provide "limitation[s] on remedies in cases involving orphan works." Rapp wrote just before the actual legislation was introduced, but still got it right. "The legislation will...seek to rectify

Rising gas prices dominate the headlines these days. Our paper in Albany featured a photo of a family of three, with a gas pump wrapped around them collectively, like a python. It's a squeeze, all right, and a daily topic of conversation around here. Fuel Economy is a website - an almanac, really - put together by the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy office within the U.S. Department of (you guessed it) Energy. In addition to linking to sites with information on why we're paying $3.80 a gallon (check out the FAQs section in their "Gasoline Prices" section), there's also a wealth of material to help you when you're buying that new hybrid vehicle, or exploring alternative fuels. And now, I'm off to drive my six-cylinder car to Kerhonkson. See you there!

Looking for a contract packager? We’ve written about co-packing for food producers before (see Josee’s entries: Co-Packing and Northeast Center for Food Entrepreneurship ). I recently found that Packaging Digest ’s website offers an online directory of contract packagers in the U.S. You can search by keyword or browse categories like food, health & beauty aids, medical, dental, pharmaceutical, hardware, toys and soft goods. And you can further limit by state. If you’re specifically after co-packers for food products, Specialty Food’s website directory also offers co-packer company information (scroll down to nearly the bottom of the Search by Product Category field).

Back in August 2007, I suggested using TinyURL as a means of shorten a URL, particularly when e-mailing a long URL that might hit a line break. Unfortunately, some folks apparently enjoy hiding embarrassing and inappropriate web content, such as spam and porn, behind a TinyURL and similar services. Some users won't open them because of bad experiences. Here are two suggestions: 1) Avoid blind TinyURL clickthroughs by utilizing TinyURL's preview page and enable previews. 2) Use a service such as unshorten.com to get the original URL. This usually works not only with TinyURL.com, but also SnipURL.com , NotLong.com , Metamark.net , and zURL.ws .

While the research that we provide to our clients is invaluable, often times when the client starts the business, they have new questions. Sometimes, they will come back in to ask for more research, but when they do not come back in, where can they go to do their own research? The most obvious answer is the public library. All residents in New York can access information that is available for free through the New York State Library's online database, NOVELny . Users can access the databases using their driver's license, state issued id card, or public library card. Subject topics included in the database are Business & Finance, General Reference/School-Oriented, Health & Medicine, History, Literature/Culture/Social Science, Newspapers, and Science. While there are certain databases that will not pertain our clients, Business & Company Resource Center is available, which is a source I use very often for industry research. More information on the project is avail

We've received the latest edition of the Restaurant Industry Operations Report 2007-2008 as well as the 2008 Restaurant Industry Forecast which includes sales projections for various restaurant formats, restaurateur outlook for 2008, spending priorities, online marketing, green trends, hot categories, and the demographic outlook for consumers. It also includes statistics on the frequency of purchases by age report, foodservice occupational outlook and projected sales and employment by state. These are on our shelves along with the new Federal Yellow Book, The Lifestyle Market Analyst and the 2007 HOST Study. The 2006 SRDS Lifestyle Market Analyst book and the RMA Annual Statement Studies for 2004-05 have been de-accesioned and are up for grabs if any of your centers are interested in them.

I'm sure that many of you are involved in some sort of LISTSERV email distribution list. Most of us at the RN are on BUSLIB , and I'm sure we've mentioned it as a frequent source of information and blog ideas related to business librarianship. But sometimes people forget the proper etiquette . Here's an easy page with tips and etiquette from the North Carolina Bar Association. They even suggest emoticons!

Once upon a time, when I started working for the SBDC a decade and a half ago, getting an SBA-backed loan for a franchise was, I was told, a torturous event. Even SBA acknowledged that "inconsistent decisions", "excessively long processing time" and "failure to understand industry differences" plagued the process. Now, "in a major effort to help small business owners, the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) offers the Franchise Registry that will expedite the processing of loans to small business franchisees." Some franchises will be vetted so that the potential franchisee doesn't have to do so much work. Franchise Registry.com is in "a partnership with FRANdata , the only objective information company that researches and reports on franchising." It has some useful information, both free and for a fee; among the latter are UFOCs, Uniform Franchise Offering Circulars, which sell for $220 (older versions of the documents for $2

I could run numbers all day long. Lately, I have been running numbers all day long. But creating statistics without actually employing them is like taking empty breaths. At the beginning of each month, I calculate such things as the average turnaround time; the number of requests asked; the number that are answered, and by whom; and break down the requests by advisor & by center. It's a part of the management function of the library, and something that my inner accounting-major actually enjoys. But I've never shared this information with any of you in the field. This blog isn't the place (I'd rather not broadcast it openly for the world). If you're interested in knowing how often you're using us, or how often your center in comparison with others, or any other general program data, then drop me an email. I'll put together a package for you. (Keep in mind that my data is available only for the fiscal year starting October 1st.) *** Earlier in the w

When I checked my mail after work yesterday, there was a flyer advertising a work-at-home oppotunity that made me both laugh out loud and feel bad for the nice people in my neighborhood that will fall for it. In order to become involved in the "valuable home work and business opportunities" the flyer indicates that interested parties should send $5 and a self-addressed stamped envelope to a P.O. Box in Albany. Of course "No experience needed! Great pay! Free information!" sounds enticing, but the reality is that the company "BIG Capital" gives no contact information. Needless to say, there is no evidence that this is a scam, but all signs point to a rip-off. In the five weeks that I have been here, I have conducted research for three clients that have invested in dubious work-at-home opportunities. While the Better Business Bureau is the place to file formal complaints against a company, it provides little detail on the complaint or how it was handled.

Really Bad Powerpoint With Staff Training nearly upon us, I thought maybe a little advice on putting together a presentation might be in order. I was very much enjoying a presentation given by Seth Godin while researching motivational speakers at another blog called Small Business Marketing Strategies . Seth Godin's presentation is very worth checking out simply for it's humor but also for reminding us to think. His website describes his title as "Agent of Change" which I love. He points out the many silly things that tools supposedly made for people don't work and the ways they could be fixed. This led to Godin's blog which advertises his many books that all look like they would be fun reads. In this blog entry, he discusses the pitfalls of PowerPoint presentations and links to other sites that share advice on how to best use PowerPoint without abusing your audience.

I “attended” a webinar on podcasting a couple of weeks ago. While the focus was on the use of podcasting by libraries, here are a few tidbits that would be useful to anyone: Looking for podcasts to subscribe to? Check iTunes or PodcastAlley . Or even a podcast network like the technology-related TWiT Netcast Network . Want to create your own podcasts? It doesn’t have to be too tricky or expensive. Audacity offers free, and easy-to-use sound recording and editing software. About.com has a step-by-step tutorial, “ How to Create Your Own Podcast ” that will lead you through the process. The Research Network has been pondering how we might use podcasting. Any suggestions for topics you’d like to see?

These advertising to sales ratios from AdAge Magazine can help a business benchmark advertising spending by showing the average amount that businesses in an industry spend on ads. Covering dozens and dozens of industries, the reports show advertising as a percent of sales, advertising as a percent of margin, and ad growth percentage. The figures cover 1997 through 2007.